Until recently, the world is now interconnected with social media. Social media platforms have enabled people and organizations to interconnect by sharing information and news. Some main forums adopted include Whatsapp, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and even Tiktok. In the US, for instance, Twitter is widely used and one of the popular social media networks that politicians, celebrities, the public, and even journalists have adopted to disseminate information. History Twitter was founded in the year 2006 in San Francisco. It has been used widely to track trending topics to update users on current events. In this analytical essay, more emphasis will be on the use of Twitter by President Trump during his presidency and also during the 2020 US election. The essay will analyze the key concerns and potential implications and challenges the social media platforms causes concerning the case study.
Twitter has had an impact in the US, especially in the political sphere. Many politicians have been at the forefront of utilizing this social platform. For instance, in the case of President Trump, three days after his election in 2016, he turned to his Twitter account to talk about how he was about to make significant decisions about running his government (Elorreaga 483). Twitter became his primary tool for conveying the message. It is argued that Trump got hold of the Twitter account to advance his political agenda and gain more power. The platform made him rise as it increased more trust of his followers. However, in some instances, it has been claimed that Mr. Trump was engaged in misinformation dealings through the platform.
Moreover, in the 2020 elections, Mr. Trump was on social media claiming a big win for him. The attempt was misinformed in that the votes were still counted, and the presidential winner had yet to be projected. The controversy began to circulate in the Twitter forum, being more spread by his followers. However, Twitter management did hide the tweet so that anyone wishing to look at it could be required to click to view it (Phillips 135). Additionally, they limited the replies to the tweet. The strategy is adopted to prevent the spread of lies. According to social media policies, users must adhere to ethical considerations. The media then have to be responsible for spreading sensitive information that might bring about cultural and political implications.
For Mr. Trump, Twitter had been more than a social media. Trump used it as a direct line to the voters. The platform became his prominent news coverage which also came to define him. A keen analysis of the tweets of his feeds reveals that, over time, Twitter enabled him to have control over the forces in the White House (Macafee 326). The change in Trump’s quest for using Twitter to advance his ideologies also prompted the growth of social media as more strategies to establish the truth. It is important to note that Mr. Trump could use Twitter to defend himself.
The president is expected to fulfill the promises in their manifesto as the critical agenda, but to Mr. Trump, this did not come first. During his presidency, there was an alarm about the number of tweets the president could make. According to the news group’s reports, the agenda was to direct the national conversation using ideas and words on the social platform. Howe, through the American polls majority of people, was not comfortable with the amount of time the president spent on the platform (Lewandowsky et al. 5). A keen observer could argue that Mr. Trump employed this strategy to secure and prepare himself for the re-election bid. According to him, his Twitter account was the most appropriate platform for his supporters to get what he thought to be said.
Although Mr. Trump used his Twitter account in several cases for misinformation, the polls could be different. For instance, in the 2020 general elections, the polls had, in numerous instances, revealed that Mr. Trump was trailing badly against his worthy competitor, the Democratic candidate Joe Biden (Scacco & Coe 425). Even after the polls, Mr. Trump still could not agree with reality. One of his tweets read, “We are up BIG, but they are trying to STEAL the Election (Ott & Dickinson 610). We will never let them do it. Votes cannot be cast after the polls are closed!” A careful analysis of the tweet would reveal that Trump had felt some defeat and wanted to create a mountain out of a molehill. A resounding defeat was looming, but he wanted to play with the minds of people not to accept the outcome if it was not in his favor.
Mr. Trump’s unethical practices did not end just by justifying himself on Twitter. He further went ahead to fight the newsgroups such as New York Times. He numerous occasions, he was captured, referring to it as a “failing” New York Times. Looking keenly at the president’s stand, one could question the morality standards he upheld (Kellner 50). For instance, the case reported an increase in subscribers in this. However, Mr. Trump tweeted, “Wow, the @NY times is losing thousands of subscribers because of their inferior and highly inaccurate coverage of the Trump phenomena.” The president could not accept any newsroom that was not in his support (Larson n.p). He could tilt the truth and offer negative criticism through Twitter with a focus on building up his public image.
Additionally, it has been noted that Mr. Trump held press conferences on a few occasions. Instead, the president focused on staging controlled interviews and used Twitter because he had control over them. For him, he did not want his message filtered by the press. That is why even he constantly attacked social media (Natsheh n.p). As a result, all these malicious strategies have had implications and challenges for social media platforms. The backlashes to the newsgroup personnel by the political class would automatically impede their work (Stolee & Caton 147). This is because there might be a fear of unfair prosecutions for covering and revealing the correct information. However, currently, the newsgroup and social media policies are doing well. For instance, offensive or sensitive information might be flagged off or hidden to prevent ill information from being transmitted.
In conclusion, social media platforms have been used, especially by the political class, to propagate their ideas and what they think is best for them. Most information might not be factual but for personal gains in fame and popularity. For instance, in the case of Mr. Trump, he adopted the use of Twitter as a weapon to fight those not in his support and build his image through misinformation. However, political leaders need to make good use of digital platforms for the benefit of all.
Works Cited
Elorreaga, Gabriel. “Do not delete that tweet: federal and presidential records in the age of social media.”. Mary’s LJ 50 (2019): 483.
Kellner, Douglas. “Trump’s war against the media, fake news, and (a) social media.” Trump’s Media War. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2019. 47–67.
Larson, Annika Kay. “Donald Trump’s Twitter and His Influence on the Media: A Study of How Political Social Media Accounts Impact Press Coverage.” The University of Washington http://www. Com. Washington. Edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Larson-Honors-Thesis-Final. Pdf. Accessed May 18 (2018).
Lewandowsky, Stephan, Michael Jetter, and Ullrich KH Ecker. “Using the president’s tweets to understand political diversion in the age of social media.” Nature communications 11.1 (2020): 1-12.
Macafee, Timothy. “Biased into posting: interactions with social media network political posts during the 2016 US presidential election.” Communication Research Reports 36.4 (2019): 326–337.
Natsheh, Bayan Robin. “Social Media as a Tool of Persuasion in Political Marketing: Analyzing the discourse of Trump’s Tweets during his Presidential Campaign.” (2019).
Ott, Brian L., and Greg Dickinson. “The Twitter presidency: How Donald Trump’s tweets undermine democracy and threaten us all.” Political Science Quarterly 135.4 (2020): 607–636.
Phillips, Caylee. “Trump’s Twitter Tension: Is Social Media a Modern Restriction on Government Employees?.” SMU Sci. & Tech. L. Rev. 24 (2021): 135.
Scacco, Joshua M., and Kevin Coe. “Securing the guardrails of democracy? Accountability and presidential communication in the 2020 election.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 107.4 (2021): 423–429.
Stolee, Galen, and Steve Caton. “Twitter, Trump, and the base: A shift to a new form of presidential talk?.” Signs and Society 6.1 (2018): 147-165.
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